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The grumpy thread


outlaw118

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Must admit I'm the same. I wired my dashcam in properly I guess it took about an hour. Haven't used it yet, but judging by the amount of times my boss downloads our coach dash cams it won't be long. It's amazing how we get the blame for some misdemeanor on the road until my boss suggests to the accuser that he will check the cameras all around the coach. Then things go very quiet and he Nevers hears back from them.

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14 minutes ago, andyberg said:

Must admit I'm the same. I wired my dashcam in properly I guess it took about an hour. Haven't used it yet, but judging by the amount of times my boss downloads our coach dash cams it won't be long. It's amazing how we get the blame for some misdemeanor on the road until my boss suggests to the accuser that he will check the cameras all around the coach. Then things go very quiet and he Nevers hears back from them.

That's why the one vehicle of mine that does have one is the camper.  It's the one which seems to be the biggest magnet for idiots...plus is the least likely to be able to evade trouble.

Plus it was the easiest to get apart for installation being basically a 70s commercial vehicle design.  Windscreen being about three and a half feet tall meant I could tuck the camera away behind the rear view mirror so it's basically invisible.

IMG_20220411_161829.thumb.jpg.da24de7bd8f4e9749d4704b4c9a2ad68.jpg

I get the feeling that getting the Caddy apart to install it will be more of a pain, because 90s VW.

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Mair Marketplace fannies.

I posted up on Friday that I had been offering a single bed and mattress for free on Marketplace. SUZANNA promised to come at 6 to collect. After dismantling the bed and howfing  it down my awkward stair for her, I was royally patched.

So my wife thought she'd have a go at offering it on Marketplace for free instead. GEMMA said she'd be delighted to have it as she found herself in temporary housing and it would be for her 8 year old child. My wife also offered to throw in some very nice cushions for her. She thought she was doing someone a good turn. GEMMA said her brother would come for it in his Jeep at 7. Half past came and went and no further messages were read by her or responded to.  Patched and that was the second time today as well but I can't be arsed telling that story.

We've got a skip coming next week  and we are having a massive clear out. Since it seems to be impossible for me to try and help these people without them taking the cunt,  I'm planning on being fucking ruthless with stuff I don't want.

What's wrong with people?

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2 hours ago, sheffcortinacentre said:

Re state of roads in the UK it's down to the fact that like everything else maintenance has been cut into the bone, a survey recently said that in syorks that if not one bit got worse it would take 10 years  at the current rate to fix them all !!!

Yep, but they will, of course, become rough tracks in those 10 years! At least some of our sink potholes get patched, after contact.

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2 hours ago, Split_Pin said:

Mair Marketplace fannies.

I posted up on Friday that I had been offering a single bed and mattress for free on Marketplace. SUZANNA promised to come at 6 to collect. After dismantling the bed and howfing  it down my awkward stair for her, I was royally patched.

So my wife thought she'd have a go at offering it on Marketplace for free instead. GEMMA said she'd be delighted to have it as she found herself in temporary housing and it would be for her 8 year old child. My wife also offered to throw in some very nice cushions for her. She thought she was doing someone a good turn. GEMMA said her brother would come for it in his Jeep at 7. Half past came and went and no further messages were read by her or responded to.  Patched and that was the second time today as well but I can't be arsed telling that story.

We've got a skip coming next week  and we are having a massive clear out. Since it seems to be impossible for me to try and help these people without them taking the cunt,  I'm planning on being fucking ruthless with stuff I don't want.

What's wrong with people?

Theres a council-run charity down my way called furnihelp who will pick up furniture and distribute it to people in genuine need. Anything like that in your area?

I know charity shops have a track record of being ridiculously fussy, but these guys will take anything as long as its usable and has a fire label 

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That is a slight benefit of a large car, large bulky items on marketplace are easy! 

Can usually get a deal too, if your a nice, cohesive enquiry after a week of the above, suddenly turning up 5 minutes later in a suitable vehicle that fits it gets money off every time! 

Got the kids bunkbed that way, and a sofa or 2 in the past. Always worth owning an estate, you never know when you want it

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Daughter was going out in her C3, saw that a tyre was soft, got her inflator out and when she was fastening the hose to the valve, the valve blew out of the wheel.

Abandoned it and went on the bus instead, told me about it yesterday when she got home, apparently her youngest son, a bike mechanic, glued the valve back in with superglue, reinflated the tyre and declared it all OK :(

I wasn't happy with that, siad that I would swap the spare in and have the valve replaced.

Went to remove the wheel (ten-minute job :roll: ) and the wheel bolts were solid, took a good half hour jumping on a breaker bar to get them to shift.

Bolts were rusty so wire brushed them and smear a thin coat of coppaslip on them, tried them in the holes and they refused to go in.

When I looked closer the holes in the disc didn't align with the bolt holes.

Got a mel hammer and punch and forced the disc into alignment, using the screw holes where the screws weren't, snapped off.

The discs are clearly new, had them fitted in January along with four new tyres, springs etc.

Looks like the valve was defective.  Taken it to have a new one fitted.

When I got home from dropping the wheel off I thought it best to check the tyre pressures, which were OK but the spare seemed to be leaking :(

Except it was jut the radiator fan running on :)

 

 

IMG_20220505_133435342_HDR.jpg

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Apparently just buying bog standard 1.2W wedge type dash lamps in a physical shop isn't something I can do now.  Unless I want to pay £1.99 each in Halfords - and they have a total of 2 in stock.

Had expected to just buy a box from Motorserv, however they "don't do those any more" apparently.  They really are as much use as a chocolate teapot lately, no idea what it was that happened a few months ago, but overnight they went from being pretty decent to less useful than Halfords.

Great, guess I buy another pack from Amazon and see if more than 30% last longer than 24 hours in actual service this time...

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I have a sticky caliper somewhere on the Mazda yet again - just a few months after begrudgingly paying for the calipers to be changed. None of them are getting significantly hotter than the rest, and the problem seems to clear after a few miles.... but in stop-start traffic I can definitely feel something dragging as the car doesn't roll on like it should - it pulls up to a definite stop.

I don't really have time to be working on cars at the moment as my end-of-year exams start in 2 weeks and I should be spending my time preparing for them, but it looks like I'll have to compromise. Why can't these things just happen when I've got a little free time?! 🤬

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The unit nextdoor to mine sell secondhand junk. I came in this morning and they've dragged some of their crap outside and in their parking area. This means their customers park where the car stops, if that's right across two MoT parking only signs so be it . Their first customer of the day was so indecisive .First she parked at another unit further up, then she didn't.Then the next one sideways, then forward. Then she decided to move again. I am trying to get the cars out of my unit usually reversing out and along to the side but because of her faffing about I reversed the Land Rover straight back straight into a motorbike which I didn't see in any of the mirrors as there was a truck one side and a traffic cone the other side. I'm still miffed with myself even now. 

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11 minutes ago, Crackers said:

I have a sticky caliper somewhere on the Mazda yet again - just a few months after begrudgingly paying for the calipers to be changed. None of them are getting significantly hotter than the rest, and the problem seems to clear after a few miles.... but in stop-start traffic I can definitely feel something dragging as the car doesn't roll on like it should - it pulls up to a definite stop.

I don't really have time to be working on cars at the moment as my end-of-year exams start in 2 weeks and I should be spending my time preparing for them, but it looks like I'll have to compromise. Why can't these things just happen when I've got a little free time?! 🤬

Might be best to concentrate on the exams first, then deal with the car when they're over.

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23 minutes ago, Zelandeth said:

Apparently just buying bog standard 1.2W wedge type dash lamps in a physical shop isn't something I can do now.  Unless I want to pay £1.99 each in Halfords - and they have a total of 2 in stock.

Had expected to just buy a box from Motorserv, however they "don't do those any more" apparently.  They really are as much use as a chocolate teapot lately, no idea what it was that happened a few months ago, but overnight they went from being pretty decent to less useful than Halfords.

Great, guess I buy another pack from Amazon and see if more than 30% last longer than 24 hours in actual service this time...

100% do not buy lucas ones! my usual supplier were out of stock so I got a few packs of 24v lucas bulbs for a volvo truck dash that had been sent in without any bulbs at all.

Running the dash on my bench on a 24v supply, I fitted about 30 bulbs and had it on bulb test mode with them all on for a couple of minutes while I checked the pointer calibration.

We lost 6 bulbs by then. Then I cranked the voltage up to 28.5v and more and more started going.

In the end I went through almost the full box of 96 bulbs to find 30 that would last long enough to get it out of the door. Customer was desperate for the dash back so I told him the situation and included all my spare bulbs with the dash.

The truck had a 1/2 mile journey to the MOT station the following day, and by the time it had got there the left indicator telltale and the full beam indicator had packed up! luckily the tester let him swap some more bulbs in and sneak through.

I was suspicious they might have been incorrectly labelled 12v bulbs, but TBH they weren't even that bright and drew a little bit less power than they were specced to. 

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15 minutes ago, cobblers said:

100% do not buy lucas ones! my usual supplier were out of stock so I got a few packs of 24v lucas bulbs for a volvo truck dash that had been sent in without any bulbs at all.

Running the dash on my bench on a 24v supply, I fitted about 30 bulbs and had it on bulb test mode with them all on for a couple of minutes while I checked the pointer calibration.

We lost 6 bulbs by then. Then I cranked the voltage up to 28.5v and more and more started going.

In the end I went through almost the full box of 96 bulbs to find 30 that would last long enough to get it out of the door. Customer was desperate for the dash back so I told him the situation and included all my spare bulbs with the dash.

The truck had a 1/2 mile journey to the MOT station the following day, and by the time it had got there the left indicator telltale and the full beam indicator had packed up! luckily the tester let him swap some more bulbs in and sneak through.

I was suspicious they might have been incorrectly labelled 12v bulbs, but TBH they weren't even that bright and drew a little bit less power than they were specced to. 

The last batch were supposedly genuine Philips...but this is Amazon so it's anybody's guess if they were actually genuine!

Went with Osram this time...but again it's a source from the internet so goodness only knows where they're actually going to come from!

Just doing my head in how even trivially simple stuff like this has become a pain to get hold of.

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1 hour ago, Crackers said:

I have a sticky caliper somewhere on the Mazda yet again - just a few months after begrudgingly paying for the calipers to be changed. None of them are getting significantly hotter than the rest, and the problem seems to clear after a few miles.... but in stop-start traffic I can definitely feel something dragging as the car doesn't roll on like it should - it pulls up to a definite stop.

I don't really have time to be working on cars at the moment as my end-of-year exams start in 2 weeks and I should be spending my time preparing for them, but it looks like I'll have to compromise. Why can't these things just happen when I've got a little free time?! 🤬

I bet it's the sliders starting to stick. i've seen 3 or 4 cars recently that have had brake work done at a garage all having issues a few months down the line.

Every single one has had dry sliders. Not a single thing lubricated.

All just stuff rattled on with an impact wrench, bled and punted out the door again.

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5 minutes ago, Mrcento said:

I bet it's the sliders starting to stick.

Wouldn't surprise me in the least.

Unfortunately I've just gone out to jack up the front end and discovered my jack is too tall to reach under the sills to the jacking point. That's that plan fucked then.

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Went into that London the other week. Only thought about the ULEZ charge when I was already in it. Got a fine. Fair enough. 

The fine was for driving in the ULEZ area at 00:03, on 17/04. The return journey. I got a second fine today for 18:45 on 16/04, on my way in. Bastards. 

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16 hours ago, Zelandeth said:

Apparently just buying bog standard 1.2W wedge type dash lamps in a physical shop isn't something I can do now.  Unless I want to pay £1.99 each in Halfords - and they have a total of 2 in stock.

Had expected to just buy a box from Motorserv, however they "don't do those any more" apparently.  They really are as much use as a chocolate teapot lately, no idea what it was that happened a few months ago, but overnight they went from being pretty decent to less useful than Halfords.

Great, guess I buy another pack from Amazon and see if more than 30% last longer than 24 hours in actual service this time...

I've had shite luck with Amazon bulbs. Ordered a pair of Osram Nightbreakers a few years back from Amazon (direct from them, not a marketplace seller) for the Megane after I had one go out - knowing what a pain in the arse Megane II headlights were I figured I'd get decent ones and not have to do it again. I ran out of time to do it and after realising how shite one headlight was on the way to work the next morning, I figured sod this, let's see if the garage across the way from my office will sort them out for me. Dropped the car back off at lunch, I go to get in it to go home, and both new bulbs had blown! Fortunately still open, so had to get them to chuck a set on - gave me the bulbs back so I don't think they were pulling a fast one but can't be 100%. Don't think I got my money back off Amazon...

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6 minutes ago, Markeh said:

I've had shite luck with Amazon bulbs. Ordered a pair of Osram Nightbreakers a few years back from Amazon (direct from them, not a marketplace seller) for the Megane after I had one go out - knowing what a pain in the arse Megane II headlights were I figured I'd get decent ones and not have to do it again. I ran out of time to do it and after realising how shite one headlight was on the way to work the next morning, I figured sod this, let's see if the garage across the way from my office will sort them out for me. Dropped the car back off at lunch, I go to get in it to go home, and both new bulbs had blown! Fortunately still open, so had to get them to chuck a set on - gave me the bulbs back so I don't think they were pulling a fast one but can't be 100%. Don't think I got my money back off Amazon...

Loads of fake stuff on amazon. The way they handle logistics makes it almost certain.

Basically if there's 10 different sellers flogging one product on there, all the stock they supply gets chucked together in one bay. So even if the seller you used supplied amazon with genuine gear, there's no guarantee that the stock you get sent will be genuine.

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On 05/05/2022 at 17:35, Crackers said:

Wouldn't surprise me in the least.

Unfortunately I've just gone out to jack up the front end and discovered my jack is too tall to reach under the sills to the jacking point. That's that plan fucked then.

Have you got some wood like a 2x6 or something like that to raise the car by?

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On 5/5/2022 at 5:35 PM, Crackers said:

Wouldn't surprise me in the least.

Unfortunately I've just gone out to jack up the front end and discovered my jack is too tall to reach under the sills to the jacking point. That's that plan fucked then.

I've found caravan leveling ramps ideal for this, cheaper than a low Jack. They raise the car a few inches, just enough to get your normal Jack under.

Normally about a tenner used. Light weight and can be left outside.

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